South Africa would never experience chaotic land grabs, despite simmering tensions over government’s land reform programme, President Cyril Ramaphosa said on Monday night.
Ramaphosa was addressing a gathering in Lynnwood, Pretoria, as part of the ANC’s campaign ahead of the general election on May 8.
“Let’s find solutions together. The one thing that I’ve always said, that will never be allowed, is to have land grabs. We are going to solve this problem working together and finding solutions that are fit for South Africa. As South Africans we have been able to find solutions for the most difficult and almost intractable problems,” Ramaphosa said, according to ANA.
“We have great minds in our nation, and those great minds are going to be put to work to make sure that we do find solutions. Much as we live in a country where there is private ownership, we also have a hybrid type of system. There is private ownership and communal ownership. The land being claimed is for communal ownership and the Constitution recognises that.
“We have always been saying we have a Constitution, and there is a constitutional process that is now under way. The Constitution is what we are going to adhere to. We are law abiding, and the rule of law must apply. This matter is going to be handled with the seriousness, and with the delicacy it requires. We have to secure the interests of all South Africans,” Ramaphosa reportedly said.
“Land is important to black people, just as land is important to white people,” he said.
Ramaphosa merely reiterated what he said in Parliament in September last year, when he said land grabs would not be tolerated, News24 reported.
In November last year, Ramaphosa told a media gathering in Cape Town: “We have said there will be no land grabs, we have also said investors who invest in our economy should have no fear that if they invest, their investments are going to be grabbed, we are not wired like that,” City Press reported.
Source: News24
